E-mail, Feeds, 'n' Stuff

Monday, July 30, 2012

Portlandia East

This one's got several layers of weirdness working. It seems there's a truck repair shop just off the freeway out in Troutdale with a huge billboard overhead, and the owner of the shop apparently has the right to veto any message that the billboard company wants to put up. So one night the billboard company puts up a purple sign advertising a somewhat chichi hot springs resort up the road a ways. The truck repair shop owner says that his trucker customers are offended by the sign, and he wants it taken down. And so he's filed a lawsuit against the advertising company over the matter.

When the reporter calls for a comment from the truck repair shop owner? "He ain't here right now -- he's in Paris." Huh? It don't get any chichi-er than that. Just sayin'.

I like the lawyer's creative spin on how somebody "surreptitiously" installed a billboard ad over 30 feet in the air about 100 feet from an Interstate.
Owner to lawyer: "Hey they snuck that new spa ad up there when we wasn't lookin and it ain't blue collar enough for our customers' sensibilities. Would ya get a lawsuit filed on the thing while me and the missus are in Paris. We'll be gone for August cause that's when Paris empties out for holiday"

It sounds as though the repair shop made an agreement with the advertising company that they can regulate the content of the ads. It also sounds like the advertising company has not been offering them the required review beforehand, and the repair shop is flexing a little muscle.

If true, what does it matter what their reasons are for not liking it?

That's one cool place. When I was in my 20's, I used to hunt down hot springs. Bagby used to be really nice and rustic, before the tweakers came along. Austin hot springs, once a PGE-owned park, was beautiful too - until the Russians started living there, littering the banks of the river with disposable diapers and other garbage.

I'd heard a rumor of an old hot springs located somewhere near Bonneville, and spent quite a bit of time exploring the area before finally stumbling (literally) across the remains of what had once apparently been a resort. It was almost completely overgrown, and although the springs remained, I found no obvious source of cold water to bring the temps down to non-scalding levels.

I couldn't believe that nobody had bought the property, and the resource was just going to waste. A few years ago, the unimaginable happened, and it was re-developed. It looks - and feels - very nice, though more upscale than I'd have preferred. On the other hand - no tweakers or disposable diapers were seen.

Nice hot soak up around Cougar Reservoir, half way up the McKenzie Pass.
Nice hot soak roadside ... dam, can't remember, about 3 miles (10? 25?) westbound from the summit over Lolo Pass on the MT/ID border.
Good books in circulation listing soaks found and known along the Cascades &tc.

Truck stop 'repair shop' sorta jumped the shark and coulda gotten more bigger $$
by doing a deal instead of an assault ... I mean, 'bringing an action.'
That golden-egg-laying goose (the property owner's 'space rent' check in the mail each month) could easily leave the property. And set up elsewhere in the Gorge.

I'm thinking the advertisers (Outdoor & Display spending in this case) have options (modern new hi-tech), so let the billboard fall over, sell it scrap by the pound or something -- put a wind turbine on top of the pole? -- and switch to billboard ads floating in the air, laser 3D graphic apparitions.
Actual structural billboards, even the 'dynamic LED light' boards, are sooo past history.

Bonneville soak sales could put a laser-Etch-a-Sketch in a popcan by the RRtracks in the Gorge and display their purple prose BIG SIZE on the rock canyon walls ... by night; on the sheet cataract of Multnomah Falls by day. 'Public property' display areas. How about advertising apparitions 'floating in air,' is the air 'public property'?

Pepsi is trying to get a deal on Moon-surface Display advertising licensing ... seeks Moon property owner to negotiate with.
Really, who needs to rent truck stop property for signage? ... say, is this another Ackerley thing, thumbscrews, whatever?

Been to the Cougar, Tensk, and to Wind River in WA. Also to the one on the antelope preserve on the way to Malheur (VERY dusty driving, there).

35 or so years ago, there weren't a lot of guidebooks out - though I'd have only looked to see where to avoid. Soaking at Wind River one day, a Merganzer hen decided it was time for everyone to leave the nest - about 100 feet up in a Doug fir. She was paddling against the current next to me, quacking and squawking, and I was pelted with a dozen ducklings, which I hustled to remove from the hot water and toss to their Mom. Good times.

Road Work

Miles run year to date: 5
At this date last year: 3
Total run in 2017: 113
In 2016: 155
In 2015: 271
In 2014: 401
In 2013: 257
In 2012: 129
In 2011: 113
In 2010: 125
In 2009: 67
In 2008: 28
In 2007: 113
In 2006: 100
In 2005: 149
In 2004: 204
In 2003: 269